The inconstancy of American foreign policy is not an accident but an expression of two distinct sides of the American character. Both are characterized by a kind of moralism, but one is the morality of decent instincts tempered by knowledge of human imperfection and the other is the morality of absolute self-assurance fired by the crusading spirit.
Senator J. William Fulbright. The Arrogance of Power. 1966
Een indirect resultaat van de voortdurende crisis in het Midden-Oosten is dat in West-Europa een populistisch alarmisme wortel heeft geschoten. Het zaait angst, maar het heeft geen uitvoerbare oplossing. Die ligt in het Midden-Oosten, in de landen die voor het vredestichtende Westen onbereikbaar zijn geworden, zoals de praktijk heeft bewezen.
Henk Hofland. Het machteloze Westen. 17 juli 2013
America is today the leader of a world-wide anti-revolutionary movement in the defense of vested interests. She now stands for what Rome stood for. Rome consequently supported the rich against the poor in all foreign communities that fell under her sway; and, since the poor, sofar, have always and everywhere been far more numerous than the rich, Rome’s policy made for inequality, for injustice, and for the least happiness of the greatest number.
Arnold J. Toynbee. America and the World Revolution and Other Lectures. 1962.
De Amerikaanse soft power is… nog altijd sterk aanwezig… Soft power is, in de kern, de overtuigingskracht van een staat, de kracht om het debat naar zich toe te trekken, om de agenda van de wereldpolitiek te bepalen.
Het land fungeerde… decennialang als ordebewakers en politieagent — om maar te zwijgen van alle hulp die het uitdeelde. En nog steeds zijn de Verenigde Staten het anker van het hele Atlantische deel van de wereld in de ruimste zin van het woord. Het is nog altijd de 'standaardmacht,' een rol die Rusland, Europa en ook China niet snel zullen overnemen.
Geert Mak. Reizen zonder John. 2012
These early Puritans had a kink in their ideology; when they went wrong, they went very, very wrong. Devoted to the ideal of a corporate community guided by a strong moral sense, they developed a great talent for misinterpreting any opposition. From the outside, for example, they were prone to view the Indians as agents of the Devil waiting to test their convictions…
This propensity to place Evil outside their system not only distorted the Puritans’ own doctrine, it inclined them toward a solution which involved the extension of their own system over others. Here was a subtle convergence of religious and secular ideas, for mercantilism emphasized the necessity as well as the desirability of expansion in economic and political affairs.
William Appleman Williams. The Contours Of American History. 1961
[M]et een Amerikaans leger in Irak was Isis nooit zo ver gekomen… Het gematigd pacifisme is op zijn retour. De aloude ideologie is weer courant: vandaag pacifisme betekent straks meer oorlog.
Arnon Grunberg. Irak. 16 juni 2014
Opvallend is de neoconservatieve meningen van de polderpers vergeleken met de kritische beschouwingen van Amerikaanse beleidsbepalers. Ik stel u één van hen voor: Thomas Carothers:
Thomas Carothers is one of the most noted international experts on international democracy support, democratization, and U.S. foreign policy. He serves as vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he founded and currently directs the Democracy and Rule of Law Program. He has also taught at several universities in the United States and Europe, including Central European University, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and Nuffield College, Oxford, where he is a senior research fellow.
Carothers is the author of five books on international democracy and development assistance, as well as three edited volumes and a collection of his most influential essays. He has also written numerous articles for the Journal of Democracy, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and other publications. His writings have been translated into many languages.
His work has focused on the areas of civil society development, political party assistance, rule of law assistance, and democratic transitions. In addition to his research and writings, Carothers has consulted for and worked directly on democracy assistance programs for both private and public aid organizations.
Carothers previously worked at the law firm of Arnold & Porter in Washington, DC. Before that, he was an attorney-adviser at the Office of the Legal Adviser of the U.S. Department of State from 1985 to 1988. While serving at the State Department, he worked with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on democracy assistance in Latin America. This experience formed the basis for his first book, In the Name of Democracy: U.S. Policy Toward Latin America in the Reagan Years.
Carothers received a J.D. from Harvard Law School, a M.Sc. from the London School of Economics where he was a Marshall Scholar and an A.B. from Harvard College. He speaks English, French, and Spanish.
Carothers is, in tegenstellingen tot Hofland, Mak en Grunberg, een insider en een wetenschapper, die uit eigen ervaring weet waarover hij het heeft, en niet de voorgekookte meningen van neoconservatieve ideologen overschrijft. Het is ontnuchterend om zijn beschrijving te lezen met betrekking tot het zogeheten 'verspreiden van de democratie' door Washington. Ik citeer:
Thomas Carothers who describes his stand as 'Neo-Reaganite,' is one of the leading international experts on democracy promotion initiatives and U.S. foreign policy. He's currently the vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace where he is the founder and director of the Democracy and Rule of Law Program. He writes from the perspective of an insider as well as a scholar. While serving in the State Department, he worked with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on 'democracy enhancement' programs in Latin America from 1985-1988. In conclusion, Carothers writes:
'The underlying U.S. goal is maintaining the basic societal orders of particular Latin American countries approximately as they are ensuring that the economics are not drastically rearranged and that the power relations of the various social sectors are not turned upside down… The underlying objective is to maintain the basic order of what, historically at least, are quite undemocratic societies. The deep fear in the United States government of populist-based change in Latin America with all its implications for upsetting established economic and political orders and heading off in a leftist direction leads to an emphasis on incremental change from the top down. The Reagan administration came to adopt pro-democracy policies as a means of relieving pressure for more radical change, but inevitably sought only limited, top-down forms of democratic change that did not risk upsetting the traditional structures of power with which the United States has long been allied.'
En omdat, net als bij alle andere imperia in de geschiedenis, het belangrijkste doel van de Amerikaanse buitenlandse politiek is het uitbreiden en beschermen van de economische belangen van de heersende elite, dient men te weten wat propagandisten als Hofland, Mak en Grunberg verzwijgen, namelijk de mateloosheid van de Amerikaanse politieke en economische elite. Ik citeer opnieuw:
A Timeline of CIA Atrocities
By Steve Kangas
The following timeline describes just a few of the hundreds of atrocities and crimes committed by the CIA.
CIA operations follow the same recurring script. First, American business interests abroad are threatened by a popular or democratically elected leader. The people support their leader because he intends to conduct land reform, strengthen unions, redistribute wealth, nationalize foreign-owned industry, and regulate business to protect workers, consumers and the environment. So, on behalf of American business, and often with their help, the CIA mobilizes the opposition. First it identifies right-wing groups within the country (usually the military), and offers them a deal: 'We'll put you in power if you maintain a favorable business climate for us.' The Agency then hires, trains and works with them to overthrow the existing government (usually a democracy). It uses every trick in the book: propaganda, stuffed ballot boxes, purchased elections, extortion, blackmail, sexual intrigue, false stories about opponents in the local media, infiltration and disruption of opposing political parties, kidnapping, beating, torture, intimidation, economic sabotage, death squads and even assassination. These efforts culminate in a military coup, which installs a right-wing dictator. The CIA trains the dictator’s security apparatus to crack down on the traditional enemies of big business, using interrogation, torture and murder. The victims are said to be 'communists,' but almost always they are just peasants, liberals, moderates, labor union leaders, political opponents and advocates of free speech and democracy. Widespread human rights abuses follow.
This scenario has been repeated so many times that the CIA actually teaches it in a special school, the notorious 'School of the Americas.' (It opened in Panama but later moved to Fort Benning, Georgia.) Critics have nicknamed it the 'School of the Dictators' and 'School of the Assassins.' Here, the CIA trains Latin American military officers how to conduct coups, including the use of interrogation, torture and murder.
The Association for Responsible Dissent estimates that by 1987, 6 million people had died as a result of CIA covert operations. Former State Department official William Blum correctly calls this an 'American Holocaust.'
The CIA justifies these actions as part of its war against communism. But most coups do not involve a communist threat. Unlucky nations are targeted for a wide variety of reasons: not only threats to American business interests abroad, but also liberal or even moderate social reforms, political instability, the unwillingness of a leader to carry out Washington’s dictates, and declarations of neutrality in the Cold War. Indeed, nothing has infuriated CIA Directors quite like a nation’s desire to stay out of the Cold War.
The ironic thing about all this intervention is that it frequently fails to achieve American objectives. Often the newly installed dictator grows comfortable with the security apparatus the CIA has built for him. He becomes an expert at running a police state. And because the dictator knows he cannot be overthrown, he becomes independent and defiant of Washington's will. The CIA then finds it cannot overthrow him, because the police and military are under the dictator's control, afraid to cooperate with American spies for fear of torture and execution. The only two options for the U.S at this point are impotence or war. Examples of this 'boomerang effect' include the Shah of Iran, General Noriega and Saddam Hussein. The boomerang effect also explains why the CIA has proven highly successful at overthrowing democracies, but a wretched failure at overthrowing dictatorships.
The following timeline should confirm that the CIA as we know it should be abolished and replaced by a true information-gathering and analysis organization. The CIA cannot be reformed — it is institutionally and culturally corrupt.
1929
The culture we lost — Secretary of State Henry Stimson refuses to endorse a code-breaking operation, saying, 'Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail.'
1941
COI created — In preparation for World War II, President Roosevelt creates the Office of Coordinator of Information (COI). General William 'Wild Bill' Donovan heads the new intelligence service.
1942
OSS created — Roosevelt restructures COI into something more suitable for covert action, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Donovan recruits so many of the nation’s rich and powerful that eventually people joke that 'OSS' stands for 'Oh, so social!' or 'Oh, such snobs!'
1943
Italy — Donovan recruits the Catholic Church in Rome to be the center of Anglo-American spy operations in Fascist Italy. This would prove to be one of America’s most enduring intelligence alliances in the Cold War.
1945
OSS is abolished — The remaining American information agencies cease covert actions and return to harmless information gathering and analysis.
Operation PAPERCLIP – While other American agencies are hunting down Nazi war criminals for arrest, the U.S. intelligence community is smuggling them into America, unpunished, for their use against the Soviets. The most important of these is Reinhard Gehlen, Hitler’s master spy who had built up an intelligence network in the Soviet Union. With full U.S. blessing, he creates the 'Gehlen Organization,' a band of refugee Nazi spies who reactivate their networks in Russia. These include SS intelligence officers Alfred Six and Emil Augsburg (who massacred Jews in the Holocaust), Klaus Barbie (the 'Butcher of Lyon'), Otto von Bolschwing (the Holocaust mastermind who worked with Eichmann) and SS Colonel Otto Skorzeny (a personal friend of Hitler’s). The Gehlen Organization supplies the U.S. with its only intelligence on the Soviet Union for the next ten years, serving as a bridge between the abolishment of the OSS and the creation of the CIA. However, much of the 'intelligence' the former Nazis provide is bogus. Gehlen inflates Soviet military capabilities at a time when Russia is still rebuilding its devastated society, in order to inflate his own importance to the Americans (who might otherwise punish him). In 1948, Gehlen almost convinces the Americans that war is imminent, and the West should make a preemptive strike. In the 50s he produces a fictitious 'missile gap.' To make matters worse, the Russians have thoroughly penetrated the Gehlen Organization with double agents, undermining the very American security that Gehlen was supposed to protect.
1947
Greece — President Truman requests military aid to Greece to support right-wing forces fighting communist rebels. For the rest of the Cold War, Washington and the CIA will back notorious Greek leaders with deplorable human rights records.
CIA created — President Truman signs the National Security Act of 1947, creating the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Council. The CIA is accountable to the president through the NSC — there is no democratic or congressional oversight. Its charter allows the CIA to 'perform such other functions and duties… as the National Security Council may from time to time direct.' This loophole opens the door to covert action and dirty tricks.
1948
Covert-action wing created — The CIA recreates a covert action wing, innocuously called the Office of Policy Coordination, led by Wall Street lawyer Frank Wisner. According to its secret charter, its responsibilities include 'propaganda, economic warfare, preventive direct action, including sabotage, antisabotage, demolition and evacuation procedures; subversion against hostile states, including assistance to underground resistance groups, and support of indigenous anti-communist elements in threatened countries of the free world.'
Italy — The CIA corrupts democratic elections in Italy, where Italian communists threaten to win the elections. The CIA buys votes, broadcasts propaganda, threatens and beats up opposition leaders, and infiltrates and disrupts their organizations. It works -- the communists are defeated.
1949
Radio Free Europe — The CIA creates its first major propaganda outlet, Radio Free Europe. Over the next several decades, its broadcasts are so blatantly false that for a time it is considered illegal to publish transcripts of them in the U.S.
Late 40s
Operation MOCKINGBIRD — The CIA begins recruiting American news organizations and journalists to become spies and disseminators of propaganda. The effort is headed by Frank Wisner, Allan Dulles, Richard Helms and Philip Graham. Graham is publisher of The Washington Post, which becomes a major CIA player. Eventually, the CIA’s media assets will include ABC, NBC, CBS, Time, Newsweek, Associated Press, United Press International, Reuters, Hearst Newspapers, Scripps-Howard, Copley News Service and more. By the CIA’s own admission, at least 25 organizations and 400 journalists will become CIA assets.
1953
Iran – CIA overthrows the democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh in a military coup, after he threatened to nationalize British oil. The CIA replaces him with a dictator, the Shah of Iran, whose secret police, SAVAK, is as brutal as the Gestapo.
Operation MK-ULTRA — Inspired by North Korea’s brainwashing program, the CIA begins experiments on mind control. The most notorious part of this project involves giving LSD and other drugs to American subjects without their knowledge or against their will, causing several to commit suicide. However, the operation involves far more than this. Funded in part by the Rockefeller and Ford foundations, research includes propaganda, brainwashing, public relations, advertising, hypnosis, and other forms of suggestion.
1954
Guatemala — CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup. Arbenz has threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years.
1954-1958
North Vietnam — CIA officer Edward Lansdale spends four years trying to overthrow the communist government of North Vietnam, using all the usual dirty tricks. The CIA also attempts to legitimize a tyrannical puppet regime in South Vietnam, headed by Ngo Dinh Diem. These efforts fail to win the hearts and minds of the South Vietnamese because the Diem government is opposed to true democracy, land reform and poverty reduction measures. The CIA’s continuing failure results in escalating American intervention, culminating in the Vietnam War.
1956
Hungary — Radio Free Europe incites Hungary to revolt by broadcasting Khruschev’s Secret Speech, in which he denounced Stalin. It also hints that American aid will help the Hungarians fight. This aid fails to materialize as Hungarians launch a doomed armed revolt, which only invites a major Soviet invasion. The conflict kills 7,000 Soviets and 30,000 Hungarians.
1957-1973
Laos — The CIA carries out approximately one coup per year trying to nullify Laos’ democratic elections. The problem is the Pathet Lao, a leftist group with enough popular support to be a member of any coalition government. In the late 50s, the CIA even creates an 'Armee Clandestine' of Asian mercenaries to attack the Pathet Lao. After the CIA’s army suffers numerous defeats, the U.S. starts bombing, dropping more bombs on Laos than all the U.S. bombs dropped in World War II. A quarter of all Laotians will eventually become refugees, many living in caves.
1959
Haiti — The U.S. military helps 'Papa Doc' Duvalier become dictator of Haiti. He creates his own private police force, the 'Tonton Macoutes,' who terrorize the population with machetes. They will kill over 100,000 during the Duvalier family reign. The U.S. does not protest their dismal human rights record.
1961
The Bay of Pigs — The CIA sends 1,500 Cuban exiles to invade Castro’s Cuba. But 'Operation Mongoose' fails, due to poor planning, security and backing. The planners had imagined that the invasion will spark a popular uprising against Castro -– which never happens. A promised American air strike also never occurs. This is the CIA’s first public setback, causing President Kennedy to fire CIA Director Allen Dulles.
Dominican Republic — The CIA assassinates Rafael Trujillo, a murderous dictator Washington has supported since 1930. Trujillo’s business interests have grown so large (about 60 percent of the economy) that they have begun competing with American business interests.
Ecuador — The CIA-backed military forces the democratically elected President Jose Velasco to resign. Vice President Carlos Arosemana replaces him; the CIA fills the now vacant vice presidency with its own man.
Congo (Zaire) — The CIA assassinates the democratically elected Patrice Lumumba. However, public support for Lumumba’s politics runs so high that the CIA cannot clearly install his opponents in power. Four years of political turmoil follow.
1963
Dominican Republic — The CIA overthrows the democratically elected Juan Bosch in a military coup. The CIA installs a repressive, right-wing junta.
Ecuador — A CIA-backed military coup overthrows President Arosemana, whose independent (not socialist) policies have become unacceptable to Washington. A military junta assumes command, cancels the 1964 elections, and begins abusing human rights.
1964
Brazil — A CIA-backed military coup overthrows the democratically elected government of Joao Goulart. The junta that replaces it will, in the next two decades, become one of the most bloodthirsty in history. General Castelo Branco will create Latin America’s first death squads, or bands of secret police who hunt down 'communists' for torture, interrogation and murder. Often these 'communists' are no more than Branco’s political opponents. Later it is revealed that the CIA trains the death squads.
1965
Indonesia — The CIA overthrows the democratically elected Sukarno with a military coup. The CIA has been trying to eliminate Sukarno since 1957, using everything from attempted assassination to sexual intrigue, for nothing more than his declaring neutrality in the Cold War. His successor, General Suharto, will massacre between 500,000 to 1 million civilians accused of being 'communist.' The CIA supplies the names of countless suspects.
Dominican Republic — A popular rebellion breaks out, promising to reinstall Juan Bosch as the country’s elected leader. The revolution is crushed when U.S. Marines land to uphold the military regime by force. The CIA directs everything behind the scenes.
Greece — With the CIA’s backing, the king removes George Papandreous as prime minister. Papandreous has failed to vigorously support U.S. interests in Greece.
Congo (Zaire) — A CIA-backed military coup installs Mobutu Sese Seko as dictator. The hated and repressive Mobutu exploits his desperately poor country for billions.
1966
The Ramparts Affair — The radical magazine Ramparts begins a series of unprecedented anti-CIA articles. Among their scoops: the CIA has paid the University of Michigan $25 million dollars to hire 'professors' to train South Vietnamese students in covert police methods. MIT and other universities have received similar payments. Ramparts also reveals that the National Students’ Association is a CIA front. Students are sometimes recruited through blackmail and bribery, including draft deferments.
1967
Greece — A CIA-backed military coup overthrows the government two days before the elections. The favorite to win was George Papandreou, the liberal candidate. During the next six years, the 'reign of the colonels' — backed by the CIA — will usher in the widespread use of torture and murder against political opponents. When a Greek ambassador objects to President Johnson about U.S. plans for Cypress, Johnson tells him: 'Fuck your parliament and your constitution.'
Operation PHOENIX — The CIA helps South Vietnamese agents identify and then murder alleged Viet Cong leaders operating in South Vietnamese villages. According to a 1971 congressional report, this operation killed about 20,000 'Viet Cong.'
1968
Operation CHAOS — The CIA has been illegally spying on American citizens since 1959, but with Operation CHAOS, President Johnson dramatically boosts the effort. CIA agents go undercover as student radicals to spy on and disrupt campus organizations protesting the Vietnam War. They are searching for Russian instigators, which they never find. CHAOS will eventually spy on 7,000 individuals and 1,000 organizations.
Bolivia — A CIA-organized military operation captures legendary guerrilla Che Guevara. The CIA wants to keep him alive for interrogation, but the Bolivian government executes him to prevent worldwide calls for clemency.
1969
Uruguay — The notorious CIA torturer Dan Mitrione arrives in Uruguay, a country torn with political strife. Whereas right-wing forces previously used torture only as a last resort, Mitrione convinces them to use it as a routine, widespread practice. 'The precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect,' is his motto. The torture techniques he teaches to the death squads rival the Nazis’. He eventually becomes so feared that revolutionaries will kidnap and murder him a year later.
1970
Cambodia — The CIA overthrows Prince Sahounek, who is highly popular among Cambodians for keeping them out of the Vietnam War. He is replaced by CIA puppet Lon Nol, who immediately throws Cambodian troops into battle. This unpopular move strengthens once minor opposition parties like the Khmer Rouge, which achieves power in 1975 and massacres millions of its own people.
1971
Bolivia — After half a decade of CIA-inspired political turmoil, a CIA-backed military coup overthrows the leftist President Juan Torres. In the next two years, dictator Hugo Banzer will have over 2,000 political opponents arrested without trial, then tortured, raped and executed.
Haiti — 'Papa Doc' Duvalier dies, leaving his 19-year old son 'Baby Doc' Duvalier the dictator of Haiti. His son continues his bloody reign with full knowledge of the CIA.
1972
The Case-Zablocki Act — Congress passes an act requiring congressional review of executive agreements. In theory, this should make CIA operations more accountable. In fact, it is only marginally effective.
Cambodia — Congress votes to cut off CIA funds for its secret war in Cambodia.
Watergate Break-in — President Nixon sends in a team of burglars to wiretap Democratic offices at Watergate. The team members have extensive CIA histories, including James McCord, E. Howard Hunt and five of the Cuban burglars. They work for the Committee to Reelect the President (CREEP), which does dirty work like disrupting Democratic campaigns and laundering Nixon’s illegal campaign contributions. CREEP’s activities are funded and organized by another CIA front, the Mullen Company.
1973
Chile — The CIA overthrows and assassinates Salvador Allende, Latin America’s first democratically elected socialist leader. The problems begin when Allende nationalizes American-owned firms in Chile. ITT offers the CIA $1 million for a coup (reportedly refused). The CIA replaces Allende with General Augusto Pinochet, who will torture and murder thousands of his own countrymen in a crackdown on labor leaders and the political left.
CIA begins internal investigations — William Colby, the Deputy Director for Operations, orders all CIA personnel to report any and all illegal activities they know about. This information is later reported to Congress.
Watergate Scandal — The CIA’s main collaborating newspaper in America, The Washington Post, reports Nixon’s crimes long before any other newspaper takes up the subject. The two reporters, Woodward and Bernstein, make almost no mention of the CIA’s many fingerprints all over the scandal. It is later revealed that Woodward was a Naval intelligence briefer to the White House, and knows many important intelligence figures, including General Alexander Haig. His main source, 'Deep Throat,' is probably one of those.
CIA Director Helms Fired — President Nixon fires CIA Director Richard Helms for failing to help cover up the Watergate scandal. Helms and Nixon have always disliked each other. The new CIA director is William Colby, who is relatively more open to CIA reform.
1974
CHAOS exposed — Pulitzer prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh publishes a story about Operation CHAOS, the domestic surveillance and infiltration of anti-war and civil rights groups in the U.S. The story sparks national outrage.
Angleton fired — Congress holds hearings on the illegal domestic spying efforts of James Jesus Angleton, the CIA’s chief of counterintelligence. His efforts included mail-opening campaigns and secret surveillance of war protesters. The hearings result in his dismissal from the CIA.
House clears CIA in Watergate — The House of Representatives clears the CIA of any complicity in Nixon’s Watergate break-in.
The Hughes Ryan Act — Congress passes an amendment requiring the president to report non-intelligence CIA operations to the relevant congressional committees in a timely fashion.
1975
Australia — The CIA helps topple the democratically elected, left-leaning government of Prime Minister Edward Whitlam. The CIA does this by giving an ultimatum to its Governor-General, John Kerr. Kerr, a longtime CIA collaborator, exercises his constitutional right to dissolve the Whitlam government. The Governor-General is a largely ceremonial position appointed by the Queen; the Prime Minister is democratically elected. The use of this archaic and never-used law stuns the nation.
Angola — Eager to demonstrate American military resolve after its defeat in Vietnam, Henry Kissinger launches a CIA-backed war in Angola. Contrary to Kissinger’s assertions, Angola is a country of little strategic importance and not seriously threatened by communism. The CIA backs the brutal leader of UNITAS, Jonas Savimbi. This polarizes Angolan politics and drives his opponents into the arms of Cuba and the Soviet Union for survival. Congress will cut off funds in 1976, but the CIA is able to run the war off the books until 1984, when funding is legalized again. This entirely pointless war kills over 300,000 Angolans.
'The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence' — Victor Marchetti and John Marks publish this whistle-blowing history of CIA crimes and abuses. Marchetti has spent 14 years in the CIA, eventually becoming an executive assistant to the Deputy Director of Intelligence. Marks has spent five years as an intelligence official in the State Department.
'Inside the Company' — Philip Agee publishes a diary of his life inside the CIA. Agee has worked in covert operations in Latin America during the 60s, and details the crimes in which he took part.
Congress investigates CIA wrong-doing — Public outrage compels Congress to hold hearings on CIA crimes. Senator Frank Church heads the Senate investigation ('The Church Committee'), and Representative Otis Pike heads the House investigation. (Despite a 98 percent incumbency reelection rate, both Church and Pike are defeated in the next elections.) The investigations lead to a number of reforms intended to increase the CIA’s accountability to Congress, including the creation of a standing Senate committee on intelligence. However, the reforms prove ineffective, as the Iran/Contra scandal will show. It turns out the CIA can control, deal with or sidestep Congress with ease.
The Rockefeller Commission — In an attempt to reduce the damage done by the Church Committee, President Ford creates the 'Rockefeller Commission' to whitewash CIA history and propose toothless reforms. The commission’s namesake, Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, is himself a major CIA figure. Five of the commission’s eight members are also members of the Council on Foreign Relations, a CIA-dominated organization.
1979
Iran — The CIA fails to predict the fall of the Shah of Iran, a longtime CIA puppet, and the rise of Muslim fundamentalists who are furious at the CIA’s backing of SAVAK, the Shah’s bloodthirsty secret police. In revenge, the Muslims take 52 Americans hostage in the U.S. embassy in Tehran.
Afghanistan — The Soviets invade Afghanistan. The CIA immediately begins supplying arms to any faction willing to fight the occupying Soviets. Such indiscriminate arming means that when the Soviets leave Afghanistan, civil war will erupt. Also, fanatical Muslim extremists now possess state-of-the-art weaponry. One of these is Sheik Abdel Rahman, who will become involved in the World Trade Center bombing in New York.
El Salvador — An idealistic group of young military officers, repulsed by the massacre of the poor, overthrows the right-wing government. However, the U.S. compels the inexperienced officers to include many of the old guard in key positions in their new government. Soon, things are back to 'normal' — the military government is repressing and killing poor civilian protesters. Many of the young military and civilian reformers, finding themselves powerless, resign in disgust.
Nicaragua — Anastasios Samoza II, the CIA-backed dictator, falls. The Marxist Sandinistas take over government, and they are initially popular because of their commitment to land and anti-poverty reform. Samoza had a murderous and hated personal army called the National Guard. Remnants of the Guard will become the Contras, who fight a CIA-backed guerrilla war against the Sandinista government throughout the 1980s.
1980
El Salvador — The Archbishop of San Salvador, Oscar Romero, pleads with President Carter 'Christian to Christian' to stop aiding the military government slaughtering his people. Carter refuses. Shortly afterwards, right-wing leader Roberto D’Aubuisson has Romero shot through the heart while saying Mass. The country soon dissolves into civil war, with the peasants in the hills fighting against the military government. The CIA and U.S. Armed Forces supply the government with overwhelming military and intelligence superiority. CIA-trained death squads roam the countryside, committing atrocities like that of El Mazote in 1982, where they massacre between 700 and 1000 men, women and children. By 1992, some 63,000 Salvadorans will be killed.
1981
Iran/Contra Begins — The CIA begins selling arms to Iran at high prices, using the profits to arm the Contras fighting the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. President Reagan vows that the Sandinistas will be 'pressured' until 'they say "uncle."' The CIA’s Freedom Fighter’s Manual disbursed to the Contras includes instruction on economic sabotage, propaganda, extortion, bribery, blackmail, interrogation, torture, murder and political assassination.
1983
Honduras — The CIA gives Honduran military officers the Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual – 1983, which teaches how to torture people. Honduras’ notorious 'Battalion 316' then uses these techniques, with the CIA’s full knowledge, on thousands of leftist dissidents. At least 184 are murdered.
1984
The Boland Amendment — The last of a series of Boland Amendments is passed. These amendments have reduced CIA aid to the Contras; the last one cuts it off completely. However, CIA Director William Casey is already prepared to 'hand off' the operation to Colonel Oliver North, who illegally continues supplying the Contras through the CIA’s informal, secret, and self-financing network. This includes 'humanitarian aid' donated by Adolph Coors and William Simon, and military aid funded by Iranian arms sales.
1986
Eugene Hasenfus — Nicaragua shoots down a C-123 transport plane carrying military supplies to the Contras. The lone survivor, Eugene Hasenfus, turns out to be a CIA employee, as are the two dead pilots. The airplane belongs to Southern Air Transport, a CIA front. The incident makes a mockery of President Reagan’s claims that the CIA is not illegally arming the Contras.
Iran/Contra Scandal — Although the details have long been known, the Iran/Contra scandal finally captures the media’s attention in 1986. Congress holds hearings, and several key figures (like Oliver North) lie under oath to protect the intelligence community. CIA Director William Casey dies of brain cancer before Congress can question him. All reforms enacted by Congress after the scandal are purely cosmetic.
Haiti — Rising popular revolt in Haiti means that 'Baby Doc' Duvalier will remain 'President for Life' only if he has a short one. The U.S., which hates instability in a puppet country, flies the despotic Duvalier to the South of France for a comfortable retirement. The CIA then rigs the upcoming elections in favor of another right-wing military strongman. However, violence keeps the country in political turmoil for another four years. The CIA tries to strengthen the military by creating the National Intelligence Service (SIN), which suppresses popular revolt through torture and assassination.
1989
Panama — The U.S. invades Panama to overthrow a dictator of its own making, General Manuel Noriega. Noriega has been on the CIA’s payroll since 1966, and has been transporting drugs with the CIA’s knowledge since 1972. By the late 80s, Noriega’s growing independence and intransigence have angered Washington… so out he goes.
1990
Haiti — Competing against 10 comparatively wealthy candidates, leftist priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide captures 68 percent of the vote. After only eight months in power, however, the CIA-backed military deposes him. More military dictators brutalize the country, as thousands of Haitian refugees escape the turmoil in barely seaworthy boats. As popular opinion calls for Aristide’s return, the CIA begins a disinformation campaign painting the courageous priest as mentally unstable.
1991
The Gulf War — The U.S. liberates Kuwait from Iraq. But Iraq’s dictator, Saddam Hussein, is another creature of the CIA. With U.S. encouragement, Hussein invaded Iran in 1980. During this costly eight-year war, the CIA built up Hussein’s forces with sophisticated arms, intelligence, training and financial backing. This cemented Hussein’s power at home, allowing him to crush the many internal rebellions that erupted from time to time, sometimes with poison gas. It also gave him all the military might he needed to conduct further adventurism — in Kuwait, for example.
The Fall of the Soviet Union — The CIA fails to predict this most important event of the Cold War. This suggests that it has been so busy undermining governments that it hasn’t been doing its primary job: gathering and analyzing information. The fall of the Soviet Union also robs the CIA of its reason for existence: fighting communism. This leads some to accuse the CIA of intentionally failing to predict the downfall of the Soviet Union. Curiously, the intelligence community’s budget is not significantly reduced after the demise of communism.
1992
Economic Espionage — In the years following the end of the Cold War, the CIA is increasingly used for economic espionage. This involves stealing the technological secrets of competing foreign companies and giving them to American ones. Given the CIA’s clear preference for dirty tricks over mere information gathering, the possibility of serious criminal behavior is very great indeed.
1993
Haiti — The chaos in Haiti grows so bad that President Clinton has no choice but to remove the Haitian military dictator, Raoul Cedras, on threat of U.S. invasion. The U.S. occupiers do not arrest Haiti’s military leaders for crimes against humanity, but instead ensure their safety and rich retirements. Aristide is returned to power only after being forced to accept an agenda favorable to the country’s ruling class.
EPILOGUE
In a speech before the CIA celebrating its 50th anniversary, President Clinton said: 'By necessity, the American people will never know the full story of your courage.'
Clinton’s is a common defense of the CIA: namely, the American people should stop criticizing the CIA because they don’t know what it really does. This, of course, is the heart of the problem in the first place. An agency that is above criticism is also above moral behavior and reform. Its secrecy and lack of accountability allows its corruption to grow unchecked.
Furthermore, Clinton’s statement is simply untrue. The history of the agency is growing painfully clear, especially with the declassification of historical CIA documents. We may not know the details of specific operations, but we do know, quite well, the general behavior of the CIA. These facts began emerging nearly two decades ago at an ever-quickening pace. Today we have a remarkably accurate and consistent picture, repeated in country after country, and verified from countless different directions.
The CIA’s response to this growing knowledge and criticism follows a typical historical pattern. (Indeed, there are remarkable parallels to the Medieval Church’s fight against the Scientific Revolution.) The first journalists and writers to reveal the CIA’s criminal behavior were harassed and censored if they were American writers, and tortured and murdered if they were foreigners. (See Philip Agee’s On the Run for an example of early harassment.) However, over the last two decades the tide of evidence has become overwhelming, and the CIA has found that it does not have enough fingers to plug every hole in the dike. This is especially true in the age of the Internet, where information flows freely among millions of people. Since censorship is impossible, the Agency must now defend itself with apologetics. Clinton’s 'Americans will never know' defense is a prime example.
Another common apologetic is that 'the world is filled with unsavory characters, and we must deal with them if we are to protect American interests at all.' There are two things wrong with this. First, it ignores the fact that the CIA has regularly spurned alliances with defenders of democracy, free speech and human rights, preferring the company of military dictators and tyrants. The CIA had moral options available to them, but did not take them.
Second, this argument begs several questions. The first is: 'Which American interests?' The CIA has courted right-wing dictators because they allow wealthy Americans to exploit the country’s cheap labor and resources. But poor and middle-class Americans pay the price whenever they fight the wars that stem from CIA actions, from Vietnam to the Gulf War to Panama. The second begged question is: 'Why should American interests come at the expense of other peoples’ human rights?'
The CIA should be abolished, its leadership dismissed and its relevant members tried for crimes against humanity. Our intelligence community should be rebuilt from the ground up, with the goal of collecting and analyzing information. As for covert action, there are two moral options. The first one is to eliminate covert action completely. But this gives jitters to people worried about the Adolf Hitlers of the world. So a second option is that we can place covert action under extensive and true democratic oversight. For example, a bipartisan Congressional Committee of 40 members could review and veto all aspects of CIA operations upon a majority or super-majority vote. Which of these two options is best may be the subject of debate, but one thing is clear: like dictatorship, like monarchy, unaccountable covert operations should die like the dinosaurs they are.
Related links:
Return to Liberalism Resurgent
Endnotes:
1. All history concerning CIA intervention in foreign countries is summarized from William Blum’s encyclopedic work, Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions since World War II (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 1995). Sources for domestic CIA operations come from Jonathan Vankin and John Whalen’s The 60 Greatest Conspiracies of All Time (Secaucus, N.J.: Citadel Press, 1997).
2. Coleman McCarthy, 'The Consequences of Covert Tactics' Washington Post, December 13, 1987.
Geert Mak, zojuist verheven tot Ridder van het Legioen van Eer.
Zondag 15 juni 2014 ontving ik de volgende reactie:
Anoniem heeft een nieuwe reactie op uw bericht 'De Mainstream Pers 233' achtergelaten:
Goed verhaal Stan. Sinds ik je weblog volg over Geert Mak, kijk ik met heel andere ogen naar hem. Vroeger vond ik hem zeer sympathiek, nu een beetje dom. Sinds dat interview met Sharon heeft die Mariëlle Tweebeke voor mij afgedaan.
Corrie
Ik denk dat deze lezeres zich vergist, en in feite pleit dit alleen maar voor haar, een eeuwige intense scepsis is ook niet alles. Desondanks, Mak is niet 'een beetje dom.' Net als Hofland en Grunberg -- om deze drie praatjesmakers als exemplarisch te gebruiken voor de werkwijze van de mainstream pers -- is Mak als opiniemaker op de hoogte van de Amerikaanse misdaden. Dit drietal is niet 'een beetje dom,' maar uitermate geslepen. Ze weten precies waar de grenzen van de officiële consensus liggen. Ze zeggen exact wat de mainstream-media willen, ze weten tot op de millimeter wat de zelfbenoemde 'politiek-literaire elite' in de polder tolereert en vooral ook wat niet. Daarbij moet moeten ze over een ijzeren discipline beschikken om de werkelijkheid niet te zien, om telkens weer de boodschap van de elite uit te dragen. In tegenstelling tot deze goed betaalde propagandisten accepteren kritische burgers deze tucht goddank niet, en vertellen hun eigen verhaal. En als nu het gedrag van propagandisten wordt gekwalificeerd als 'een beetje dom' dan vrees ik dat men daarmee even blind voor de werkelijkheid wordt als de propagandisten zelf. De narcistische houding van dit drietal is niet 'een beetje dom,' maar een pathologische reactie op een diepzittende psychologische stoornis. Ik bedoel, men moet toch wel knettergek zijn om aan de hand van de feiten tot de conclusie te kunnen komen dat het Westen onder aanvoering van de VS een 'vredestichtende ordebewaker' is en dat daarom de 'aloude ideologie weer courant [is]: vandaag pacifisme betekent straks meer oorlog,' en wel omdat 'Qui desiderat pacem, bellum praeparat.' De Romeinen beschikten evenwel over het zwaard, de huidige grootmachten beschikken over chemische, biologische, en nucleaire massavernietigingswapens, die een Full Spectrum Dominance in de strijd zullen werpen. We worden geleid en geïnformeerd door ijdele krankzinnigen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmDrHRfo2SE
Full-spectrum dominance is a military entity's achievement of control over all dimensions of the battlespace, effectively possessing an overwhelming diversity of resources in such areas as terrestrial, aerial, maritime, subterranean, extraterrestrial, psychological, and bio- or cyber-technological warfare.
Full spectrum dominance includes the physical battlespace; air, surface and sub-surface as well as the electromagnetic spectrum and information space. Control implies that freedom of opposition force assets to exploit the battlespace is wholly constrained.
NATO's Full Spectrum Dominance
‘LOOKING TOWARDS THE WALES SUMMIT’: “NATO MUST BE A FULL-SPECTRUM ALLIANCE”
Speech by NATO Deputy Secretary General Ambassador Vershbow at the NATO Defence College in Rome on 13 June 2014
Edited by Nigel Chamberlain
The Summit will have three broad themes:
1. Afghanistan - We will formally launch our new mission, Resolute Support, provided that the necessary security agreements are signed. We are also aiming to finalize commitments by Allies and partners to continue funding the Afghan security forces. And we will outline the future of our political and practical relationship with Afghanistan through our Enduring Partnership.
2. The Transatlantic Bond - I hope to see a formal ‘Transatlantic Declaration’ in which North American and European Allies will reaffirm their mutual commitment to each other’s security and will agree to do more to share the burden of security more equitably. In particular, I hope that this commitment can be translated into an undertaking by European Allies to progressively increase their defence spending and moving towards the NATO benchmark of 2% of GDP.
3. ‘Future NATO’ - This is about making sure that NATO is ready to deal with any challenge, wherever it happens, and whenever it occurs. It is essentially about having the right capabilities, the right concepts and the right partnerships to enable us to deal with both the predictable and the unpredictable events that the future might bring. There are at least three preliminary lessons that will influence ‘Future NATO’ in our Summit preparations.
A. Maintaining strong defence and deterrence in Europe.
Russia’s aggression has prompted us to go ‘back to basics’ and to re-emphasize the Alliance’s original purpose of collective defence. We are reviewing our threat assessments, intelligence-sharing arrangements, early-warning procedures, and crisis response planning. We are looking to strengthen the ability of our NATO Response Force to respond quickly to any threat against any member of the Alliance, including where we have little warning. And we are reviewing our Connected Forces Initiative to make our exercises more frequent, more demanding, and more visible. These are some of the strands of a ‘Readiness Action Plan’ that we are now developing in preparation for the Summit in September.
B. Dealing with global risks and threats.
In order to deal with all the challenges from terrorism, piracy, proliferation, energy security and cyber warfare the Strategic Concept that we adopted four years ago identified three core tasks for NATO: collective defence, crisis management and cooperative security. NATO cannot be a one-dimensional Alliance. It must be a full-spectrum Alliance. This means that we must have a full spectrum of capabilities, many of which are multifunctional. Assets like Special Forces, drones, and transport aircraft are relevant to all three tasks. We must be ready to deploy whenever and wherever required, and with the high level of interoperability that we have attained through nearly two decades of non-stop operations. This puts a premium on our military training, exercises, education and on our Smart Defence initiative, to encourage multinational solutions that can fill the capability gaps seen in recent operations more efficiently, and to ensure that the European members of the Alliance and Canada can shoulder greater responsibility relative to the United States.
C. Investing in relationships as well as in capabilities.
NATO has built a network of partnerships with more than 40 countries from all over the globe. Our partners have made a major contribution to the success of our missions and operations, helping to provide security well beyond the Euro-Atlantic area. By plugging into NATO operations, partners can multiply the effect of their own contributions, and strengthen the interoperability of their forces with those of NATO Allies. They can benefit from NATO’s expertise on a range of issues, from security sector reform to civil emergency planning.
Allies are now looking at various ways to deepen and broaden our partnerships. We could, for example, intensify our political consultations by making them more frequent and more focused. We could engage certain interested partners on specific subjects of common concern, by using both established fora like the Mediterranean Dialogue and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, as well as smaller, more flexible formats. We want to preserve and strengthen our interoperability, including through partner involvement in the NATO Response Force, as well as participation in joint military education, training and exercises. We also want to continue to involve interested partners in Smart Defence projects, to develop capabilities together that will strengthen the security of all our nations. We want to take further steps to explore and realize more of that potential at our Wales Summit in September.
“FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE: TOTALITARIAN DEMOCRACY IN THE NEW WORLD ORDER”
Review of F. William Engdahl's book
For over 30 years, F. William Engdahl has been a leading researcher, economist, and analyst of the New World Order with extensive writing to his credit on energy, politics, and economics. He contributes regularly to business and other publications, is a frequent speaker on geopolitical, economic and energy issues, and is a distinguished Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.
Engdahl’s two previous books include “A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order” explaining that America’s post-WW II dominance rests on two pillars and one commodity – unchallengeable military power and the dollar as the world’s reserve currency along with the quest to control global oil and other energy resources.
Engdahl’s other book is titled “Seeds of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation” on how four Anglo-American agribusiness giants plan world domination by patenting all life forms to force-feed GMO foods on everyone – even though eating them poses serious human health risks.
Engdahl’s newest book is reviewed below. Titled “Full Strectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order,” it discusses America’s grand strategy, first revealed in the 1998 US Space Command document – Vision for 2020. Later released in 2000 as DOD Joint Vision 2020, it called for “full spectrum dominance” over all land, surface and sub-surface sea, air, space, electromagnetic spectrum and information systems with enough overwhelming power to fight and win global wars against any adversary, including with nuclear weapons preemptively.
Other means as well, including propaganda, NGOs and Color Revolutions for regime change, expanding NATO eastward, and “a vast array of psychological and economic warfare techniques” as part of a “Revolution in Military Affairs” discussed below.
September 11, 2001 served as pretext to consolidate power, destroy civil liberties and human rights, and wage permanent wars against invented enemies for global dominance over world markets, resources, and cheap labor – at the expense of democratic freedoms and social justice. Engdahl’s book presents a frightening view of the future, arriving much sooner than most think.
Introduction
After the Soviet Union’s dissolution in late 1989, America had a choice. As the sole remaining superpower, it could have worked for a new era of peace and prosperity, ended decades of Cold War tensions, halted the insane arms race, turned swords into plowshares, and diverted hundreds of billions annually from “defense” to “rebuild(ing) civilian infrastructure and repair(ing) impoverished cities.”
Instead, Washington, under GHW Bush and his successors, “chose stealth, deception, lies and wars to attempt to control the Eurasian Heartland – its only potential rival as an economic region – by military (political, and economic) force,” and by extension planet earth through an agenda later called “full spectrum dominance.”
As a result, the Cold War never ended and today rages with over a trillion dollars spent annually on “defense” in all forms even though America has no enemy, nor did it after the Japanese surrendered in August 1945. So the solution was to invent them, and so they were.
Post-Soviet Russia, “The ‘new’ Cold War assumed various disguises and deceptive tactics until September 11, 2001″ changed the game. It let George Bush “declare (a) permanent (Global War on Terror) against an enemy who was everywhere and nowhere, who allegedly threatened the American way of life, justified (police state) laws,” and is now destroying our freedoms and futures.
The roots of the scheme go back decades – at least to 1939 when powerful New York Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) insiders planned a post-war world with one nation alone triumphant and unchallengeable.
Engdahl’s book is a geopolitical analysis of the past two decades – peering into “the dark corners of Pentagon strategy and actions and the extreme dangers (‘full spectrum dominance’ holds for) the future,” not just to America but the entire world.
Things are so out-of-control today that democratic freedoms and planetary life itself are threatened by “the growing risk of nuclear war by miscalculation” or the foolhardy assumption that waging it can be limited, controlled, and safe – like turning a faucet on and off. The very notion is implausible and reckless on its face, yet powerful forces in the country think this way and plan accordingly.
The Guns of August 2008
On the 8th day of the 8th month of the 8th year of the new century, a place few people in the West ever heard of made headlines when Georgia’s army invaded South Ossetia – its province that broke away in 1991 and declared its independence. For a brief period, world tensions were more heightened than at any time since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis when only cooler heads avoided possible nuclear war.
Like then, the crisis was a Washington provocation with tiny Georgia a mere pawn in a dangerous high-stakes confrontation – a new Great Game that former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski described in his 1997 book, “The Grand Chessboard.”
He called Eurasia the “center of world power extending from Germany and Poland in the East through Russia and China to the Pacific and including the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent.” He explained that America’s urgent task was to assure that “no state or combination of states gains the capacity to expel the United States from Eurasia or even to diminish significantly its decisive arbitration role.” Dominating that part of the world is key to controlling the planet, and its the main reason for NATO’s existence. From inception, its mission was offense.
Post-Cold War, Washington used the illusion of democracy to dominate everywhere – with the long arm of the Pentagon and NATO as enforcers. Euphoric East Europeans couldn’t know that American-style democracy was even more repressive than what had ended. Decades of Voice of America and Radio Free Europe propaganda was soon revealed to be no different than the Soviet system they rejected and in some ways much worse.
Western-imposed “shock therapy” meant “free market” hokum, mass privatizations, ending the public sphere, unrestricted access for foreign corporations unemcumbered by pesky regulations, deep social service cuts, loss of job security, poverty wages, repressive laws, and entire economies transformed to benefit a powerful corporate ruling class partnered with corrupted political elites. Globally, Russia got billionaire “oligarchs,” China “the princelings,” Chile “the piranhas,” and in new millennium America the Bush-Cheney “Pioneers” and Obama Wall Street Top Guns wrecking global havoc for self-enrichment.
As for ordinary people, Russia is instructive for what’s heading everywhere:
– mass impoverishment;
– an epidemic of unemployment;
– loss of pensions and social benefits;
– 80% of farmers bankrupted;
– tens of thousands of factories closed and the country de-industrialized;
– schools closed;
– housing in disrepair;
– skyrocketing alcoholism, drug abuse, HIV/AIDS, suicides, and violent crime; and
– a declining population and life expectancy because the country was looted for profit and all safety nets ended; what Milton Friedman called “freedom.”
Mikhail Gorvachev tried to revitalize Soviet Russia with Glasnost and Perestroika but failed. In return for agreeing to “shock therapy” and nuclear disarmament, GHW Bush promised no eastward NATO extension into newly liberated Warsaw Pact countries. The Russian Duma, in fact, ratified Start II, providing a firm disarmament schedule – contingent on both countries prohibiting a missile defense deployment as stipulated under the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM).
On December 14, 2001, the Bush administration withdrew from ABM and much more. It claimed the right to develop and test new nuclear weapons (in violation of NPT), rescinded the Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention, greatly increased military spending, refused to consider a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty to increase already large stockpiles, and claimed the right to wage preventive wars under the doctrine of “anticipatory self-defense” using first-strike nuclear weapons.
The door was now open for enhanced militarization, creation of the US Missile Defense Agency, and proof again that trusting America is foolhardy and dangerous. Both GHW Bush and Bill Clinton lied by enticing former Warsaw Pact countries into NATO, one by one.
At the beginning of the 1990s, Zbigniew Brzezinski described America’s arrogance this way:
“Presidential travels abroad assumed the trappings of imperial expeditions, overshadowing in scale and security demands the circumstances of any other statesman (reflecting) America’s anointment as the world’s leader (to be) in some respects reminiscent of Napoleon’s self-coronation.”
Brzezinski understood the dangers of imperial arrogance, causing the decline and fall of previous empires. Even a superpower like the US is vulnerable. He was very comfortable with an American Century, only leery of the means to achieve and keeping it. In 2008, with 28 NATO country members, including 10 former Warsaw Pact ones, Washington sought admission for Georgia and Ukraine, and did so after announcing in early 2007 the planned installation of interceptor missiles in Poland and advanced tracking radar in the Czech Republic, both NATO members.
Allegedly for defense against Iran and other “rogue” states, it clearly targeted Russia by guaranteeing America a nuclear first-strike edge, and that provoked a sharp Kremlin response. Washington’s deployment is for offense as are all US/NATO installations globally.
Vladimir Putin expressed outrage in his February 2007 Munich International Conference on Security address stating:
“NATO has put its frontline forces on our borders. (It) does not have any relation with the modernisation of the Alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represent a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have a right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended? And what happened to the assurances our western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact?”
Putin’s speech drew a storm of US media Russia-bashing. Last August, it got this writer to comment in an article titled “Reinventing the Evil Empire,” saying: Russia is back, proud and re-assertive, and not about to roll over for America, especially in Eurasia. For Washington, it’s back to the future with a new Cold War, but this time for greater stakes and with much larger threats to world peace.
Over the past two decades, Washington upped the ante, encroaching on Russia’s borders and encircling it with NATO/US bases clearly designed for offense and to block the spread of democratic freedoms to former Soviet Republics. “Diabolical propaganda” made it work by projecting imperial America as a colonial liberator bringing “free market” capitalism to the East. It succeeded as “long as the United States was the world’s largest economy and American dollars were in demand as (the) de facto world reserve currency….” For decades, America “portray(ed) itself as the beacon of liberty for newly independent nations of Africa and Asia,” as well as former Soviet Republics and Warsaw Pact nations.
Geopolitical Reality – America’s New Manifest Destiny, Global Expansion to the Vastness of Eurasia
For over a century, America sought “total economic and military control over (Soviet) Russia” through the full strength of its military-industrial-security sectors – by war or other means. From 1945, the Pentagon planned a first-strike nuclear war, an “all out conventional war (called) TOTALITY (as) drafted by General Dwight Eisenhower” per Harry Truman’s order, the same man who used atomic weapons against a defeated Japan instead of accepting its requested surrender.
With the dissolution of the Soviet Union, America’s superpower supremacy depends on “precluding Eurasian countries from developing their own defense pillars or security structures independent of US-controlled NATO,” especially to prevent a powerful China-Russia alliance capable of serious challenge, along with other Eurasian states, notably oil rich ones.
As geopolitical strategist Halford Mackinder (1861 – 1947) observed in his most famous dictum:
“Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland;
Who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island;
Who rules the World-Island commands the World.”
Who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island;
Who rules the World-Island commands the World.”
Mackinder’s World-Island was Eurasia, all of Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
Early in the last century and notably post-WW II, America determined to rule even at the risk of all out nuclear war. For its part, Britain intended to stay in the game, and in April 1945, Winston Churchill urged Dwight Eisenhower and Franklin Roosevelt “to launch an immediate full-scale war against the Soviet Union, using up to 12 captured German divisions (as) cannon fodder to destroy Russia once and for all.”
Instead, Washington invented a post-war enemy, and got Europe and Asian countries to feel threatened enough to agree to US dictates, even ones contrary to their own interests. As for America, in 1945, Truman ordered Eisenhower “to prepare secret plans for a surprise nuclear strike on some (Soviet) cities (despite knowing the Kremlin) posed no direct or immediate threat to the United States” or its close allies.
A nuclear-armed Russia with intercontinental missile capabilities halted the threat – until the 2001 Bush Doctrine asserted the right to wage preventive wars, with first-strike nuclear weapons, to depose foreign regimes perceived dangerous to US security and interests. That was the strategy behind the 2008 Georgian conflict that could have escalated into nuclear war.
Defused for the moment, “a number of leading US policy makers (see Russia today) as unfinished business (and seek its) complete dismemberment (as) an independent pivot for Eurasia.” Nuclear superiority, encirclement, and “diabolical propaganda” are three tools among others to finish the job and leave America the sole remaining superpower. Disempowering Russia and China will create an open field for a “total global American Century – the realization of ‘full spectrum dominance,’ as the Pentagon called it.”
Today, under Obama as under Bush, the risk of nuclear war by miscalculation is highest in nearly half a century. With America the clear aggressor, Russia may feel its only option is strike first while able or delay and face the consequences when it’s too late. The closer offensive nuclear missiles are to its borders, the nearer it gets to disempowerment, further dismemberment, and possible nuclear annihilation.
Its reaction left few doubts of its response. In February 2007, Strategic Rocket Forces commander Col. Gen. Nikolai Solovtsov said “Moscow would target US Ballistic Missile Defense sites with its nuclear arsenal if Washington” proceeded with its plans. Putin delivered harsh rhetoric and announced Russia would spend $190 billion over the next eight years to modernize its military by 2015 and that state-of-the-art weapons would take precedence. His message was clear. A New Cold War/nuclear arms race was on with Russia ready to contend “out of national survival considerations,” not a desire for confrontation.
“Missile Defense” for Offense
On March 23, 1983, Ronald Reagan proposed the idea in a speech calling for greater Cold War military spending, including a huge R & D program for what became known as “Star Wars” – in impermeable anti-missile space shield called the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). The idea then (and now) was fantasy, but a glorious one for defense contractors who’ve profited hugely ever since.
The Clinton administration gave it modest support until the National Missile Defense Act of 1999 proposed an active missile defense “as soon as is technologically possible….”
When George Bush became president, Donald Rumsfeld wanted war preparations to include missile defense and space-based weapons to destroy targets anywhere in the world quickly for “full spectrum dominance.” The strategy included “deployment of a revolutionary new technique of regime change to impose or install ‘US-friendly’ regimes throughout the former Soviet Union and across Eurasia.”
Controlling Russia – Color Revolutions and Swarming Coups
“Swarming” is a RAND Corporation term referring to “communication patterns and movement of” bees and other insects and applying it to military conflict by other means. It plays out through covert CIA actions to overthrow democratically elected governments, remove foreign leaders and key officials, prop up friendly dictators, and target individuals anywhere in the world.
Also through propaganda and activities of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the International Republican Institute (IRI), and National Democratic Institute (NDI) – posing as NGOs but, in fact, are US government-funded organizations charged with subverting democracy, uprooting it where it exists, or preventing its creation by criminally disruptive means. Methods include non-violent strikes, mass street protests, and major media agitprop for regime change – much like what’s now playing out in Iran after its presidential election.
Other recent examples include the Belgrade 2000 coup against Slobodan Misosevic, Georgia’s 2003 Rose Revolution ousting Eduard Shevardnadze for the US-installed stooge, Mikheil Saakashvili, and the 2004-05 Ukraine Orange Revolution, based on faked electoral fraud, to install another Washington favorite, Viktor Yushchenko. The idea is to isolate Russia by cutting off its economic lifeline – the “pipeline networks that (carry its) huge reserves of oil and natural gas from the Urals and Serbia to Western Europe and Eurasia…” They run through Ukraine, a nation “so intertwined (with Russia) economically, socially and culturally, especially in the east of the country, that they were almost indistinguishable from one another.”
Achieving geopolitical aims this way is far simpler and cheaper than waging wars “while convincing the world (that regime change was the result of) spontaneous outbursts for freedom. (It’s) a dangerously effective weapon.”
In 1953, cruder CIA methods toppled democratically elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh – the agency’s first successful coup d’etat to install Reza Shah Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran.
In 1954, it deposed the popularly elected Jacobo Arbenz and replaced him with a military dictator – on the pretext of removing a non-existent communist threat. Arbenz, like other targets, threatened US business interests by favoring land reform, strong unions, and wealth distribution to alleviate extreme poverty in their countries.
Short of war, various tactics aim to prevent them: “propaganda, stuffed ballot boxes, bought elections, extortion, blackmail, sexual intrigue, false stories about opponents in the local media, transportation strikes, infiltration and disruption of opposing political parties, kidnapping, beating, torture, intimidation, economic sabotage, death squads and even assassination (culminating in) a military (or other coup to install) a ‘pro-American’ right-wing dictator” – while claiming it’s democracy in action. For decades, countries in Latin America, the Middle East, and other world regions have been frequent victims.
Since the CIA’s 1947 creation, “national security” and a fake communist threat justified every imaginable crime from propaganda to economic warfare, sabotage, assassinations, coup d’etats, torture, foreign wars and much more.
However, by the 1960s, new forms of covert regime change emerged along the lines that RAND studies called “swarming” – the idea being to develop social manipulation techniques or disruptive outbreaks short of wars or violent uprisings. After 2000, as mentioned above, they played out in Central Europe’s Color Revolutions. According to State Department and intelligence community officials, “It seemed to be the perfect model for eliminating regimes opposed to US policy,” whether or not popularly elected. Every regime is now vulnerable to “new methods of warfare” by other means, including economic ones very much in play now and earlier.
Organizations like the Gene Sharp Albert Einstein Institution, George Soros’ Open Society Foundation, Freedom House and others are very much involved, and Sharp’s web site admits being active with “pro-democracy” groups in Burma, Thailand, Tibet, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus, and Serbia. They all conveniently “coincided with the US State Department’s targets for regime change over the same period.”
Eurasian Pipeline Wars
Central to the current conflict is control of the region’s vast oil and gas reserves, and as long as Russia can use its resources “to win economic allies in Western Europe, China, and elsewhere, it (can’t) be politically isolated.” As a result, Moscow reacts harshly to military encirclement and bordering Color Revolutions – hostile acts, the geopolitical equivalence of war.
For America to remain the sole superpower, controlling global oil and gas flows is crucial along with cutting off China from Caspian Sea reserves and securing the energy routes and networks between Russia and the EU.
It’s why America invaded and occupies Afghanistan and Iraq, incited Baltic wars in the 1990s, attacked Kosovo and Serbia in 1999, threatens Iran repeatedly and imposes sanctions, and keeps trying to oust Hugo Chavez. For its part under Vladimir Putin, Russia’s economy began to grow for the first time in decades. It’s rich in oil and gas, and uses them strategically to gain influence enough to rival Washington, especially in alliance with China and other former Soviet states like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, united in the 2001-formed Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) with Iran and India having observer status.
Under Bush-Cheney, Washington reacted aggressively. “full spectrum dominance” is the aim with Russia and China the main targets. Controlling world energy resources is central, and nothing under Obama has changed. Iraq’s occupation continues and Afghanistan operations are enhanced with increased troop deployments under newly appointed General Stanley McChrystal’s command – a hired gun, a man with a reputation for brutishness that includes torture, assassinations, indifference to civilian deaths, and willingness to destroy villages to save them.
As long as Russia and China stay free from US control, “full spectrum dominance” is impossible. Encircling the former with NATO bases, Color Revolutions, and incorporating former Soviet states into NATO and the EU are all part of the same grand strategy – “deconstruct(ing) Russia once and for all as a potential rival to a sole US Superpower hegemony.”
Vladimir Putin stands in the way, “a dynamic nationalist (leader) committed to rebuilding” his country. In 2003, a defining geopolitical event occurred when Putin had billionaire oligarch, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, arrested on charges of tax evasion and put his shares in giant Yukos Oil group under state control.
It followed a decisive Russian Duma (lower house) election in which Khodorkovsky “was reliably alleged” to have used his wealth for enough votes to gain a majority – to challenge Putin in 2004 for president. Khodorkovsky violated his pledge to stay out of politics in return for keeping his assets and stolen billions provided he repatriate enough of them back home.
His arrest also came after a report surfaced about a meeting with Dick Cheney in Washington, followed by others with ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco. They discussed acquiring a major stake of up to 40% of Yukos or enough to give Washington and Big Oil “de facto veto power over future Russian oil and gas pipelines and oil deals.” Khodorkovsky also met with GHW Bush and had ties to the Carlyle Group, the influential US firm with figures like James Baker one of its partners.
Had Exxon and Chevron consummated the deal, it would have been an “energy coup d’etat. Cheney knew it; Bush knew it; Khodorkovsky knew it. Above all, Vladimir Putin knew it and moved decisively to block it” and hit hard on Khodorkosky in the process. It “signaled a decisive turn….towards rebuilding Russia and erecting strategic defenses.” By late 2004, Moscow understood that a New Cold War was on over “strategic energy control and unilateral nuclear primacy,” and Putin moved from defense to a “new dynamic offensive aimed at securing a more viable geopolitical position by using (Russia’s) energy as the lever.”
It involves reclaiming Russia’s oil and gas reserves given away by Boris Yeltsin. Also strengthening and modernizing the country’s military and nuclear deterrent to enhance its long-term security. Russia remains a military powerhouse and displays impressive technology at international trade shows, including the S-300 and more powerful S-400, reportedly more potent than comparable US systems.
Controlling China with Synthetic Democracy
From the 1940s to today, America’s China strategy has been “divide and conquer,” only tactics have varied from “big stick” to “carrot-and-stick” diplomacy. Key is to keep Russia and China from cooperating economically and militarily, “maintain a strategy of tension across Asia, and particularly Eurasia” (that, of course includes the Middle East and its oil riches) – for the overarching goal of total “control of China as the potential economic colossus of Asia.”
With America embroiled in Eurasian wars, policy now “masquerad(es) behind the issues of human rights and ‘democracy’ as weapons of psychological and economic warfare.”
Another initiative as well is ongoing – the 2007 AFRICOM authorization, the US Africa Command to control the continent’s 53 countries no differently than the rest of the world, using military force as necessary. China’s increasing need for Africa’s resources (including oil), not terrorism, is the reason.
The 2008 Army Modernization Strategy (AMS) focuses on “full spectrum dominance,” controlling world resources, and the prospect of wars for three to four decades to secure them. China and Russia are most feared as serious competitors – the former for its explosive economic growth and resource requirements and the latter for its energy, other raw material riches, and military strength.
AMS also included another threat – “population growth” threatening America and the West with “radical ideologies” and hence instability as well as unwanted “resource competition” that expanding economies require – everything from food to water, energy and other raw materials. These issues lay behind AFRCOM’s creation and strategy for hardline militarism globally.
America’s second president, John Adams, once said: “there are two ways to conquer and enslave a nation. One is by the sword. The other is by debt,” or more broadly economic warfare. With much of US manufacturing offshored in China, both methods are constrained so an alternative scheme is used – human rights and democracy by an America disdaining both at home or abroad.
Nonetheless, in 2004, the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor targeted China on these issues with millions in funding, headed by a right-wing conservative, Paula Dobriansky. She’s a CFR member, NED vice chairman, Freedom House board member, senior fellow at the neo-conservative Hudson Institute, and member of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) at which she endorsed attacking Iraq in 1998. Now she targets China with “soft warfare” strategy that’s just as deadly.
Other tools include the Dalai Lama organizations in Tibet, Falun Gong in China, “an arsenal of (global) NGOs” carefully recruited for their mission, and, of course, the Western media, including public television and radio in America and BBC globally.
Weaponizing Human Rights – From Darfur to Myanmar to Tibet
In targeting China, Washington’s human rights/democracy offensive focused on Myanmar, Tibet, and oil-rich Darfur. Called the “Saffron Revolution” in Myanmar (formerly Burma), it featured Western media images of saffron-robed Buddhist Monks on Yangon (formerly Rangoon) streets calling for more democracy. “Behind the scenes, however, was a battle of major geopolitical consequence” with Myanmar’s people mere props for a Washington-hatched scheme – employing Eurasian Color Revolution tactics:
– “hit-and-run swarming” mobs of monks;
– connecting protest groups through internet blogs and mobile text-messaging links; and
– having command-and-control over protest cells, dispersed and re-formed as ordered with no idea who pulled the strings or why – a hidden sinister objective targeting China for greater geopolitical control and destabilizing Myanmar to do it.
Also at stake is control of vital sea lanes from the Persian Gulf to the South China Sea with the Myanmar coastline “providing shipping and naval access to one of the world’s most strategic waterways, the Strait of Malacca, the narrow ship passage between Malaysia and Indonesia.”
Since 9/11, the Pentagon tried but failed to militarize the region except for an airbase on Indonesia’s northernmost tip. Myanmar rejected similar overtures – hence its being targeted for its strategic importance. “The Strait of Malacca, linking the Indian and Pacific Oceans, (is) the shortest sea route between the Persian Gulf and China. (It’s) the key chokepoint in Asia” so controlling it is key. China has close ties to Myanmar. It’s provided billions in military assistance and developed the infrastructure. The country is also oil-rich, on its territory and offshore.
China is the world’s fastest growing energy market. Over 80% of its oil imports pass through the Strait. Controlling it keeps a chokehold over China’s life-line, and if it’s ever closed, about half the world’s tanker fleet would have thousands of extra miles to travel at far higher freight costs.
In summer 2007, Myanmar and PetroChina signed a long-term Memorandum of Understanding – to supply China with substantial natural gas from its Shwe gas field in the Bay of Bengal. India was the main loser after China offered to invest billions for a strategic China-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline across the country to China’s Yunnan Province. The same pipeline could give China access to Middle East and African oil by bypassing the Malacca Strait. “Myanmar would become China’s ‘bridge’ linking Bangladesh and countries westward to the China mainland” trumping Washington should it succeed in controlling the Strait – a potential geopolitical disaster America had to prevent, hence the 2007 “Saffron Revolution” that failed.
India’s Dangerous Alliance Shift
From 2005, India was “pushed into a strategic alliance with Washington” to counter China’s growing influence in Asia and to have a “capable partner who can take on more responsibility for low-end operations” – directed at China and to provide bases and access to project US power in the region. To sweeten the deal, the Bush administration offered to sell (nuclear outlaw) India advanced nuclear technology. At the same time, it bashed Iran for its legitimate commercial operations, and now Obama threatens hardened sanctions and perhaps war without year end 2009 compliance with clearly outrageous demands.
Part II continues Engdahl’s important analysis to conclusion.
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Global Research News Hour on RepublicBroadcasting.org Monday – Friday at 10AM US Central time for cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on world and national issues. All programs are archived for easy listening.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14024
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14024
Seeds of Destruction
The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation
by F. William Engdahl
Global Research, 2007 ISBN 978-0-937147-2-2
This skillfully researched book focuses on how a small socio-political American elite seeks to establish control over the very basis of human survival: the provision of our daily bread. “Control the food and you control the people.”
This is no ordinary book about the perils of GMO. Engdahl takes the reader inside the corridors of power, into the backrooms of the science labs, behind closed doors in the corporate boardrooms.
The author cogently reveals a diabolical World of profit-driven political intrigue, government corruption and coercion, where genetic manipulation and the patenting of life forms are used to gain worldwide control over food production. If the book often reads as a crime story, that should come as no surprise. For that is what it is.
Engdahl’s carefully argued critique goes far beyond the familiar controversies surrounding the practice of genetic modification as a scientific technique. The book is an eye-opener, a must-read for all those committed to the causes of social justice and World peace.
What is so frightening about Engdahl’s vision of the world is that it is so real. Although our civilization has been built on humanistic ideals, in this new age of “free markets”, everything– science, commerce, agriculture and even seeds– have become weapons in the hands of a few global corporation barons and their political fellow travelers. To achieve world domination, they no longer rely on bayonet-wielding soldiers. All they need is to control food production. (Dr. Arpad Pusztai, biochemist, formerly of the Rowett Research Institute Institute, Scotland)
If you want to learn about the socio-political agenda –why biotech corporations insist on spreading GMO seeds around the World– you should read this carefully researched book. You will learn how these corporations want to achieve control over all mankind, and why we must resist… (Marijan Jost, Professor of Genetics, Krizevci, Croatia)
The book reads like a murder mystery of an incredible dimension, in which four giant Anglo-American agribusiness conglomerates have no hesitation to use GMO to gain control over our very means of subsistence… (Anton Moser, Professor of Biotechnology, Graz, Austria).
F. William Engdahl is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by F. William Engdahl
2 opmerkingen:
Hallo Stan van Houcke,
Ik heb Geert Mak nooit sympathiek gevonden. Steeds als ik hem op TV zie erger ik mij aan hem. Ik kan zijn in valse bescheidenheid gehulde mateloze ijdeltuiterij, zijn zelfingenomenheid en zijn politiek correcte manier van doen niet uitstaan. Ook zijn gewilde zogenaamde mildheid krabt mij het bloed onder de nagels vandaan. Niets aan hem komt op me over als echt oorspronkelijk. Misschien dat hij in de privésfeer zo nu en dan nog echt iets van oorspronkelijke medemenselijkheid laat zien maar in het openbaar kan ik daar niets van te merken. Daarbij komt dat ik het nooit met hem eens ben. Zijn standpunten over Europa, het westen, Rusland, de Oekraïne, het communisme, de tweede wereldoorlog, etc. beschouw ik als simplistisch en als een verloochening van de werkelijkheid. En wat hij door een witte westerse bril voor beschaafd houdt is voor mij zo'n beetje het toppunt van bekrompenheid. Maar is hij uitermate geslepen? Ja, in zijn onderbewustzijn leeft een uiterst slimme, berekenende en kille manipulator. Die werkt door hem heen en bepaalt wat hij in het openbaar te berde brengt. Maar volgens mij weet hij dat zelf niet. Het dringt niet door tot zijn bewustzijn. Hij is bang voor confrontaties. Niet alleen met anderen maar ook met zichzelf. Hij verdringt angstvallig wat er diep vanbinnen in hem leeft en doet er alles aan om een illusoire werkelijkheid in stand te houden. Dat heeft iets meelijwekkends. Ik beschouw hem als een gevangene en in zijn openbare optreden als een pion in een krachtenspel dat hij helemaal niet kent, niet doorziet. En dat heeft iets sufs. Hij heeft iets van een manipulator die zich laat manipuleren. En in die zin vind ik hem een beetje dom...
Met vriendelijke groet,
Vincent Brunott
Vincent Brunott schrijft over Geert Mak:
"Ja, in zijn onderbewustzijn leeft een uiterst slimme, berekenende en kille manipulator. Die werkt door hem heen en bepaalt wat hij in het openbaar te berde brengt."
Ik denk dat dat heel goed geobserveerd is. Ik zag toevallig gisteren een interview met George Bush waarin dat verschijnsel als in karikatuur te zien is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ36HS8dRbY
Ongelofelijk trouwens, zelfs achteraf, hoe simplistisch en klunzig Bush spreekt als hij geen voorgekookte teksten heeft. Dat hij door alle mainstream media steeds als een geloofwaardig president is neergezet zegt eigenlijk al genoeg over hun propagandistische rol...
Een reactie posten